Heather Ujiie is all of these things and a Moore faculty member with the skill-set to teach across a variety of disciplines – Fine Arts, Textile and Fashion Design and Interior Design.

“Whether I am teaching a Foundation design studio, a digital fashion studio or a hands-on textile print studio, I feel I can integrate all of my strengths and interests into each course,” she said. “I live and breathe interdisciplinary teaching.”

Ujiie, an adjunct and full-time faculty member for the past ten years, is known for developing new courses that incorporate technology and implementing museum visits, video viewing and exhibitions to expose students to contemporary artists and designers outside of the classroom.

This semester, Ujiie is teaching a fashion “bridge to major” class to first-year students. Digital Fashion Design is a required course “to get students more excited and prepared for their major,” she said. She is also teaching Drawing & Painting Into Pattern, open to all majors, and focusing on analog and digital skills for textile print for art and design.

The Digital Fashion Design class is a textile/fashion class offered under Fashion Design to introduce students to both the fashion and the textile print industry. The course is designed to gain digital skills for creating fashion flats, fashion figures, color and conceptual research and textile print design for the apparel market.

“By the time these students are seniors they will have the skills to design their own textile prints, print their own fabric and construct their own garments,” Ujiie said.

Drawing & Painting Into Pattern is a Textile Design elective. It is an introduction to textile surface print design, which has a digital component as well, but is mostly focused on painting and water-based media on paper, Ujiie said. The idea of a painted or digitally printed “pattern in repeat” is applicable to both commercial home furnishing and apparel design, as well as fine art applications. Contemporary artists and designers are integrating motifs, patterns, and networks into their work.

“We try to cover these ideas by producing both hand painted and digitally printed textiles that can reference either way of working,” Ujiie said.

Dom Streater ’10, Fashion Design, winner of Season 12 of “Project Runway,” has emphasized the importance of learning textile print and design as a fashion major. She credits being able to design her own fabrics for giving her an edge that ultimately led to her win.

“Textiles have a commercial side, where you can make a living, and a fine arts side,” Ujiie said. “You can do both when you get out of school. Fashion students develop two portfolios – a fashion portfolio with their illustrations and a textile print portfolio to get a job in the commercial textile or fashion industry. The Fine Arts students are taking textile classes as well, for developing aesthetics in their work and for their portfolio development when they get out of school.”

Ujiie knows of what she speaks. She spent the past 15 years as a textile designer in the home furnishings industry. Born and raised in New York City, she attended three universities and received three degrees – a BS in Visual Art from SUNY-New Paltz, an Associate’s degree in Surface Print Design from the Fashion Institute of Technology and a Certificate in Art Education, K-12 from Brooklyn College.

She currently designs wallpaper and has a vibrant textile art-based practice. “My personal belief is that you can be an artist and a designer at the same time, and I do that,” she said. “I also create unique visions in my textile installation work, exhibited in galleries and museums. These days I am also designing 'Art To Wear' pieces, which are unique garments that integrate all my interests in both art, design and technology."

In the past, Ujiie worked as a costume designer for off-off Broadway theatre in New York City and spent a year assisting in production of costumes for the Julliard School.

When she learned that Moore had a Textiles program, she immediately wanted to work at the College. She said Moore is unique because it stresses both fine arts and commercial design application.

“I love working at an all girl’s college because I’m all about empowering women to be successful and independent entrepreneurs,” she said. “I also love the healthy, positive competition that exists within a small all-women’s college, where every student is committed to the highest caliber of work. It’s a wonderful synthesis of real-world job skills and unique creative outcomes.”

Ujiie, who was recently asked to develop a new elective around “innovative sustainable textiles” for interior designers, believes that it’s important to keep her finger on the pulse of what’s happening in the arts world, so she often takes her students to the opera, museums and galleries. This semester, she took students to the Museum of Arts and Design (MAD) and the Brooklyn Museum in New York City.

“It’s really important for students to understand the responsibilities of being socially engaged with the community,” she said. “The most critical thing about teaching methodology is looking at a broad range of different types of art and design and not getting pigeon-holed into one area, so that they can be as innovative and engaged as possible.”

This month, Heather and some of her students exhibited work in The Gender Weave Projectat the Mt. Airy Art Garage, investigating the artists’ relationship to gender and identity.

In February, she enlisted Fashion Design students to help her work with community artist Benjamin Volta and The Galleries at Moore to design and construct a Giant Neuron Costume, integrating more than 24 children from the Russell Byers Charter School. The project culminated with an exhibition at Moore and a public performance with the students at The Franklin Institute.

Ujiie recently exhibited her work in Erotic Alchemy at the Philadelphia Art Alliance, showcasing new surface imaging technologies, including laser cutting and digital printing. She used Moore's "Fab Lab," also known as a fabrication lab, to laser cut black acryclic sheets to make an "erotic warrior garment" from multiple triangular flat shapes. These were laser cut, hand linked and grommet together together to construct an armor inspired fashion piece.

Her Projects in Digital Print Studio students also designed a work of art inspired by either the history of the Philadelphia Art Alliance or one of its featured artists, culminating with an exhibition of their own in their galleries.

“My motto is ‘Stay young, stay hip, stay current,’” Ujiie said. “Never get old, never become limited by your environment or your age and always have your finger on the pulse of what’s going on in society with technology, science and art. Be forward thinking and as well-rounded as possible to have the commercial skills to survive in the real world. The more educated and open you are, the more innovative your work will become.”

Since graduation over the summer I work at Hershey Park as a body art supervisor. I get to work with children as well as adults painting faces and creating hand drawn henna tattoos as well as other art related works. I have been with this job for seven years now so it helps being able to work with kids over the summers as well. In January I received a full-time position with the school district of Philadelphia. I teach at a high needs school in North Philadelphia. It is challenging at times, but for little moments of student enjoyment it is worth it. This is the first time in seven years that my school has had an art teacher so it is challenging as well to teach K-8 the basics and get students motivated on doing art.

My time at Moore was special and I do miss being in school from time to time. Especially hanging out with friends and having 2 am wawa runs. Student teaching prepared me for teaching because I know how to set a timeline and goals for myself. I hope to obtain my masters in special education as well as art therapy in the near future. It was always a goal of mine to give back to students who had less than I did growing up and currently I am living that goal. My advice for others who are thinking about Art Education or graduating soon would be to keep your mind open and do not settle for something and know in the end it will all work out!

I come from a family of very strong women – my mother raised three kids by herself. So when we were looking at colleges, Moore seemed like the perfect choice. We thought that a school that had been educating women for more than 160 years would provide just the nurturing, safe, challenging and creative environment I was looking for.

Auralis was one of only 10 eco-friendly designers to show her collection of sustainable fashions at The GreenShows in NYC, the premier fashion event exclusively committed to ethically sound, sustainable fashion. Lugo credits Moore with teaching her how to be the "creative master" of a project - from conception to design.

It was the only time in my career besides now that I could design whatever I wanted without any major limitations. Moore prepared me to be the head designer of a company, which is what I was able to do only five years after graduation."

“My name is Jazmin Gutierrez and I'm currently a Curatorial Studies Major with a Minor in Graphic Design. I have received three scholarships from Moore: the Admissions Grant, the Dean's Scholarship and the W. W. Smith Scholarship. They have made it possible for me to be at Moore. Originally, I was born in Guatemala and then I lived in New Jersey for a while, but after hearing about Moore, I ended up actually moving to Philadelphia. I was able to come and work here at Moore and also intern with a local nonprofit called Taller Puertorriqueño. Thanks to my work study opportunities, I've been able to work at Taller a lot more frequently, which has allowed me to focus on studies and gain experience in my field while being able to pay for rent and basic necessities that I need as a student.

Being part of Moore has allowed me an introduction to working with my peers and people of different artistic fields through student government. For example, during some of our exhibitions or programs, I've been able to talk to the students and ask them about their needs and what they would like to see more of. It has really helped in my curatorial experience because I never had an introduction on how to interact with the public or interact with other artists.”

I have been awarded my BFA in Art Education and my MA in Art Education with an Emphasis on Special Populations from Moore College of Art & Design. During my time at Moore I have learned to think critically, reflect and learn in new ways and my education has provided me with the skills and knowledge I need to stand out as professional in my field.

Through the Masters program I was taught to look at things differently and had many experiences that helped me as an educator understand how students with special needs see and experience the classroom. This experience has greatly impacted the way I teach all students. If you choose to come to Moore you will not doubt it, you will grow in so many ways.

Becoming an art teacher is something that is very rewarding and challenging. I have always wanted to work with students to help them develop their creative talents. I had a great art teacher in both grade school and high school and she recommended that I check out Moore.

Moore was exactly what I was looking for. There is a great community atmosphere here compared to other large campuses where students are one out of 1,000 who never meet each other. I enjoyed seeing the same friendly faces and loved meeting new people. The small size of the school made my education much more personal and has impacted the way I think when teaching.

Hear from Wydelah Campbell, a Graphic Design Junior, at Moore College of Art & Design. Learn about her introduction to Moore and her subsequent passion for the school, (0:13) the ease and benefits of being on campus and having everything she needs at her finger-tips, whether it's work space, the dining hall, clubs to participate in, activities with peers, (0:46) the empowerment she feels being part of an all-womens college, (1:17) her experience being a full-time mom and student simultaneously, and how supportive everyone has been, (1:30) her introduction to Graphic Design with Moore faculty Dorothy Funderwhite, (1:59) Wydelah's subsequent interest in Branding, and her hopes of interning with local Design Firm GD Loft, (2:09) her love of Moore's and Philadelphia's active & vibrant Art community, (2:35) and the plethora of things you can find to do in Philadelphia, (2:56) Moore is... (3:12)

SPECIAL THANKS TO: GDLOFT

GDLOFT is a collaborative design studio. They are based in Northern Liberties, Philadelphia with over 15 years of experience working with not-for-profit organizations, higher education, and cultural art institutions—locally and internationally. GDLOFT specializes in bringing a specific perspective to design that is rooted in a conceptual approach. They have earned a reputation and have been garnished with national and international awards by creating work that conceptually resides between fine art and graphic design. Our work is process-driven, borrowing from various methods and strategies inherent in fine arts, music, architecture and social sciences. We apply this approach to project large and small, always creating a solution that ultimately fits the clients needs, budget and time schedule. http://www.gdloft.com

Hear from Karen Daroff, a highly successful 1970 alumna of Moore’s Interior Design program and her intern Shakira Hunt ’15, a current Moore Interior Design senior. Learn about Karen’s experiences about getting a job after graduation and then starting and building her firm into the impressive and well respected global business it is today. Also hear about Shakira and her value to the business as a vibrant personality, skilled designer and thinker, and consummate professional. Both women share their love of Moore and it’s all-women creative environment.

Hear from Rebecca Kuemmerle, an Illustration Junior, with a Business Minor at Moore College of Art & Design. Learn about her experiences after winning the Sis Grenald Leadership Fellowship, (0:08) traveling to Kansas City Missouri to attend the Spectrum Fantastic Art Live conference with Fantasy Artist Donato Giancola, (0:14) leadership fellowship skills and experiences, (0:26) things valuable things she's learning in the Moore Business Scholars in the Arts program, (0:57) thinking and planning on how to be successful business leaders, (1:19) how the business minor has educated her that all artists are business owners and need to know how to properly market themselves, (1:50) the skills learned in her entrepreneurial class and the confidence that she's prepared when she graduates from Moore, (2:11) thinking about being a woman in a new way, a female leader and business owner creating success for the nation. (2:40)

Special thanks to:

Donato Giancola - From J.R.R. Tolkiens' 'The Lord of the Rings' to Botticellis' 'La Primivera', Donato Giancola balances modern concepts with realism in his paintings to bridge the worlds of contemporary and historical figurative arts. His influences encompass performances at the Brooklyn Academy of Music as well as pilgrimages to the greatest of museums - including the Uffizzi, Prado, Louvre and Hermitage. Donato recognizes the significant cultural role played by visual art and makes personal efforts to contribute to the expansion and appreciation of painting that extend beyond his clients and exhibits. To those ends, the artist teaches at the School of Visual Arts in New York City and appears at various institutions, seminars, and conventions, from San Diego to Rome to Moscow, where he performs demonstrations in oil paint and lectures on his aesthetics. http://www.donatoart.com

Spectrum Fantastic Art Live Conference - Spectrum Live is a high-energy showcase for the best and brightest in the fantasy and science fiction art community. It brings together artists, industry professionals and fans. It's a show for everyone. For artists, both established and aspiring, and fans of art. For people who love movies, video games, tabletop gaming, RPGs, card games and more. For fans of comics, science fiction, fantasy and any genre that has ever had an art component. https://spectrumfantasticartlive.com

Hear from Pamela Foulke, a Fine Arts Sophomore, at Moore College of Art & Design. Learn about her experience drawing Anime, and how it introduced her to the world of Fine Arts, (0:08) her excitement at the response to her work at National Portfolio Day, (0:23) her apprehension at going to an all-women's BFA college & and her resulting enjoyment and confidence from the environment, (0:32) frequenting Chinatown and South Street, (0:51) some of her favorite classes, (1:19) explains the print-making processes she's using and experimenting with at Moore, (1:39) Moore is... (2:47)

By the end of my time at Moore I began envisioning the future of my work existing at the intersection of curatorial and archival practices. (I would say I saw the politics of representation that we were really engaging with in an art historical sense in the curatorial department mirrored in the structures of the archives-something very much inspired by my time at SALT.)

I felt the foundation that I gained at Moore, particularly in critical theory and exhibition history, could be pushed into a more interdisciplinary realm, so in my senior year, I applied and was accepted to Simmons College in Boston, MA, where I am currently working on masters degrees in Archives Management and History.

I used the summer in between graduation and graduate school to continue learning through internship, this time at the Smithsonian Institution's Center For Folklife and Culture Heritage, where I focused predominantly on the archival processing and preservation of art and design work in the Moses and Frances Asch Collection.

Since moving to Boston, I have also interned in the Project SAVE Armenian Photograph Archives in Watertown, processing and digitizing studio portraiture, primarily from the early diaspora.

If you told Lucy Smith seven years ago that she would be doing burlesque, she never would have believed you.

Then a shy and introverted student at West Chester University, she had a love of theater and the arts, but wasn’t comfortable with her body.

“I had done theater all of my life,” Smith said. “Although I wasn’t always comfortable in my personal life, I liked the attention I got on stage. On stage I could be myself.”

After graduating with a BA in Theater in 2011, Smith decided to pursue a more stable career and enrolled in the Illustration program at Delaware College of Art & Design (DCAD). There, she said she was inspired by a fellow student to be more open and friendly. She developed more confidence and became more comfortable with herself.

Smith, now 25, has come a long way.

After graduating from DCAD with an Associate’s degree in 2013, she came to Moore to complete her BFA in Illustration. Today, as a junior, Smith is the founder of The Sexuality Club at Moore, as well as an active burlesque performer.

The Sexuality Club started in 2014 as “an outlet for Moore women to focus on self-love and self-acceptance,” and as a “respite from the negative messages in the media,” Smith said. The club hosts speakers and workshops, but the most popular event is the burlesque show, which takes place once a semester. Smith performs in the popular show as well as with burlesque groups outside of school.

“There has been a lot of positive feedback from the Moore community and outside the Moore community,” she said. Past club events have included two guest speakers who spoke on sexuality and gender issues. Upcoming events include Burlesque 101 with performer Tesla Tease (March 24 at 7 pm) and a belly dance workshop with Kim Infiniti on April 23, 2015 at 7 pm in Stewart Auditorium.

Burlesque, defined as “a literary, dramatic or musical work intended to cause laughter,” is an integral part of sexuality, so the two go together, Smith said.

“If there was no sexuality in burlesque it would just be comedic dancing,” she said. “Putting on a burlesque performance is a way for people to come to terms with creative expression of their own sexuality. My definition of sexuality is something incredibly inviting and feminine, lots of girly outfits, pretty shoes and lace.”

Smith currently performs with “The Whiskey Kittens” and "Envoute: Magic & Burlesque,” both in the Philadelphia area. She performs twice a month at different venues, from The Trocadero to the Penn Museum. She said learning burlesque is equal parts natural skill, comedic timing and “watching and learning.”

“I would learn from past performers, watch YouTube videos, listen to music and come up with my own choreography,” she said.

Her first opportunity to perform came after a role in the “Rocky Horror Puppet Show” in Philadelphia a few years ago. The director suggested she check out a burlesque show. She liked what she saw and started out as a makeup artist for Envoute ‘s Halloween show. After being asked if she would like to perform, she decided to give it a try.

“I made this little dress and bra and put peppermint-like buttons on it and candy colored trim,” she said. “The fabric was cupcakes on a pink background and I wore little pink shoes. I danced to the song ‘Candy’ by Mandy Moore and wore a pink wig. Everyone thought I did well, so that propelled me forward.”

Smith also became more invested in her education at Moore. She had always pursued drawing as a hobby and was very into anime and manga. She didn’t realize she could do so much with an Illustration degree, such as animation, concept art, even some aspects of graphic design.

“I literally thought I would be drawing comic books all day,” she said. “Moore showed me all the different things I could accomplish with my degree, so it was a good decision. I want to be an art director or creative director one day.”

Smith said that she came to Moore because of its strong career focus and its unique internship program. She also liked that Moore was an all-women’s college.

“I like the sense of community from the fellow students,” she said. “The faculty and staff also advise students to pursue what they want to do instead of what everyone else is doing. The nurturing of individuality is what helps us go far. We end up supporting each other.”

For more information on The Sexuality Club, contact Lucy at lsmith@moore.edu
View Lucy's Illustration work on Behance
View her personal portfolio here
View more artwork on her Facebook page

When I saw the work of Luke Haynes it changed everything I believed about textiles. Haynes creates complex quilts that utilize traditional pattern and realistic, contemporary imagery. Luke Haynes’s quilts are like fabric photographs: they depict and distort reality while maintaining a sense of depth and place. He also works in textile installation, combining his formal architecture education from Cooper Union with his sense for design and textile processes. His work is on a new, exciting level of contemporary textile art, and having the opportunity to work with him will be incredibly beneficial to my development as an artist. The support of the Penny Fox Fellowship will make my internship possible. It will give me the opportunity to travel to and live in Los Angeles for the duration of my internship. I have never left the East Coast, and traveling will broaden my horizons and grant me a new perspective.

In the video above, hear from Mellisa Robbins, when she was a fine arts senior at Moore College of Art & Design and Penny Fox Endowed Fellowship recipient. Learn about her internship experiences in Los Angeles with textile artist Luke Haynes, (0:12) all the self-promotional and social media techniques she learned at her internship, (0:39) the great community she experienced at Moore, (0:54) the encouraging environment and top-notch facilities at Moore, (1:17) all the great resources right outside the doors at Moore, (1:21) her visual inspirations she keeps in her studio, (1:51) her work, and her influences, (2:14) and what Moore means to her. (3:00)

Special thanks to:

LUKE Haynes is a designer working with fabric to create objects and exhibitions. His work seeks to change the way viewers understand utility based objects. His work hangs in collections, homes and museums across the United States and internationally. http://www.lukehaynes.com

PhilaMOCA is an art gallery and event space that shows movies, video game tournaments, bands and art shows. When I was working in the Career Center, I heard they were having an Eraserhead (a David Lynch film) inspired art competition and I considered going because it is a lot of stuff I’m interested in – Philadelphia bands, movie screenings, etc. I helped out at shows at the front desk taking admissions. I had the opportunity to make two posters for two different shows. I did murals outside in August.

I loved the internship at PhilaMOCA and all of the projects I got to do. I think it’s great that all students have paid required internships.

I learned new skills by designing the posters.. They showed me templates and taught me what printers expect. I was able to work with audio and lighting for all the concerts.. I’m also doing a poster for a Neil Diamond show that they have coming up.

I am interested in doing character design after I graduate. I would love to go out to California and make the characters that they use in movies

I often joke that I've been at Moore forever, but it is somewhat true. I began taking Young Artists Workshop classes in 1992 and matriculated as a BFA student studying Fashion Design in 1993. It was during that time that I took my first photography class at Moore and fell in love with the medium. Unfortunately, due to circumstances beyond my control, I left the college in 1995. I later returned to Moore from 2001 - 2004 and graduated with a BFA in Studio Art with an Art History emphasis. Much of my studio work was exploring both analog and digital photography. I even did one of the College’s first independent studies in digital photography in 2004.

After finally graduating from Moore in 2004, I entered the non-profit sector and started working in fundraising. When I saw that Moore had an open Development position, I applied for the job and began working at the college in January, 2006. Eventually my position was divided between Development and Communications and I began handling the college's website and social media presence.

In 2013, I took a refresher course in digital photography through Moore’s Continuing Education program. This experience reinvigorated my love of photography and gave me the ability to hone my skills even further. I am currently continuing my studies part-time in photography by pursuing an MFA in Studio Art at Moore. Over the past decade, I’ve worked on personal and professional photography for various friends and, more recently, for my job as Web, Social Media & Fundraising Coordinator. One of my accomplishments was photographing Moore alumna and Project Runway Season 12 winner Dom Streater '10 for the college’s marketing billboards and national magazine advertisements.

In 2013, I became a volunteer for the Philadelphia Zoo in their Camera Club and have loved the experience both as a photographer and as an animal rights advocate. The club meets monthly and has regularly scheduled photo-shoots. Members of the club contribute their best work to the zoo for use in all of their marketing materials.

As part of my graduate studio work, I am working on a collaborative photography project called Makeup & Materiality with various alternative models and makeup artist and body painter Britt Gen. Together, we work on conceptualizing the unique look for each photo shoot based upon extensive research. I study and experiment with the materiality that is present in the images, as well as the materials used during the photo shoots and in the printing process. I also experiment by using animated images, video, 3D printing and laser cutting.

I began exploring photography for the beauty industry in 2010 and became interested in the transformative power of makeup and paint on the human subject. I have always been drawn to the representation and ineffable connection between the human figure in art and photography and the broad concept of beauty. I am creating ephemeral living art – the painted body exists for the length of the photo shoot, but lives on through my photographic art.

I applied to the Studio Art program at Moore almost a year after I had graduated from West Chester University with my BFA in Studio Art. I made the decision after a year of full time figure modeling because I missed the enriching and eclectic environment of a studio based and research driven academic community. Moore has always been in my life: I attended Saturday programs at Moore while still in high school, encouraged by my high school art teacher and mentor, Susan Wolfe. I applied to Moore my senior year in high school and was accepted, but never went. I worked full time after high school and eventually after graduating from WCU with my BFA looked back to Moore for graduate possibilities.

When applying to the Graduate Studies Program at Moore I was attracted to the supportive and intimate community offered by Moore. The residency at The Burren and integrated TA experience this past year has greatly impacted and influenced my work and goals. Although I didn’t know it at the time I was applying to Moore’s Graduate

Studies, the experiences I’ve had this year have greatly redirected my goals within the program and life outside of school. The low residency program was what I needed, as I still intended to model full time while advancing through the MFA program.

My studio work and interests have always revolved around issues of identity, mostly in the form of portrait and self portrait work. I can get lost in the research and studio environment for days working on projects. I am highly focused while exploring topics in the studio: it’s a time I give to myself to explore without expectation, to play and problem solve. I’m inspired by the intimate quiets of introspective conversations and moments of honest self reflection, sometimes the kind that hurts. My work address my own issues with major depression, chronic pain, gender identity, and loss. There are very personal and painful experiences woven into the narratives of my work, it becomes cathartic. I’ve always felt the best way to talk about struggles and suffering is to just put it out there.

I’ve learned that despite how alone we can feel at times when dealing with pain, we are never truly alone. There are always others experiencing what you’re experiencing, wondering if they are alone in the universe as well. We’re all connected in some way, and my work functions as a way for me to reveal to others who I am, unfiltered or

edited.

I’m inspired by nature, mostly the organic presence of everything that surrounds me while out hiking and camping in the wilderness. When I’m in a place without modern trappings, I reconnect with my basic self, someone not influenced by technology, schedules or routine business. These wilderness experiences have helped my work

become more minimal and focused, I’m able to get to the roots of my interests and flesh it out through studio work.

The intensive studio work during my summers at Moore have helped motivate me incredibly regarding my studio research and practice. The energy I tap into during the summers has a way of filtering through the longer fall and winter semesters to keep my interest and energy up in the studio. The professors at Moore have been encouraging

and supportive, not only academically but personally as well. This is something I realized I needed in my experience at Moore, and I feel honored to be a part of a community so focused on my success as an individual and also as an artist.

I’ve battled with Major Depression and Fibromyalgia most of my life. Both are pieces of me I struggled with for decades, until I realized that in struggling with them I was struggling with myself. Bouts of depression have often times fueled incredibly detailed and involved studio projects for me, and if anything, I’m grateful to have the support

system of family and good friends, as they’ve been my strongest encouragement and biggest fans.

The year I graduated from WCU with my BFA I was diagnosed with Cervical Cancer. In a matter of months between April and June 2012 my life was altered. I had a partial hysterectomy, which left me with no cervix or uterus, but left my ovaries intact and functional. My studio work through Moore’s programs has given me the opportunity to

address major emotional issues regarding my diagnosis and surgery and in some way find peace with the events I went through. I found that the more I shared with people about my experience, the more people I discovered who had had similar experiences, or who knew others who had, this was just another way I realized how connected we all

are.

I’m also an avid rock climber. I spent this past Thanksgiving in Kentucky climbing with friends at the Red River Gorge. Climbing has influenced me greatly over the past 5 years. It’s given me self confidence which impacts my studio work and my figure modeling work as well. It’s visceral, physical and engaging. The friends I’ve made through climbing are some of the strongest friendship I’ve ever had and I’m grateful for that as well.

I love hiking and camping and often create time in my schedule to get away to do both. I have a pet rat named Socrates who is my studio mascot.

After graduation I’m going to teach. My TA experience at Moore this past semester has inspired me immensely to pursue teaching. Over the years I’ve spent as a fine art figure model I’ve watched students grow throughout the semester. I want to continue to enrich the students environment through their art experiences, but now as a teacher. Hopefully I’ll get that chance!

I also plan to travel to hike, camp and climb as these experiences impact my studio work so greatly, I can’t imagine a life without them.

The Burren residency greatly influenced the scope of my studio work. The landscape is so vast and untouched; it’s raw, mostly undeveloped and visually rich. I truly felt a connection to the land over the weeks I spent at The Burren hiking and researching. Mostly though I was inspired by the contemporary artists I learned about while attending

the BCA. One artist in particular was Cecily Brennan. Her work deals with issues of depression, physical suffering and harm and the self. Also, the community at The Burren was amazing. Everyone I met while out for a hike or just a walk in town wanted to stop and chat, truly. Those conversations were so engaging: people truly were interested in how you were liking the land and place, and in you as a person. The pace was slower and allowed for greater sincere connections. I was able to truly be in the moment while there, and I miss that community a great deal.

Shannon Jones received a scholarship to attend the 2014 TEDxPhiladelphia, a daylong multidisciplinary conference championing great ideas and bringing together engaging speakers to examine the 2014 conference theme “The New Workshop of the World.”

One of the reasons she wanted to attend the conference was to hear a TED Talk by Katherina “Kat” Rosqueta, founding executive director of the University of Pennsylvania’s Center for High Impact Philanthropy. High impact philanthropy is the practice of philanthropy with the intention of maximizing social good.

Jones, a sophomore Fine Arts major, is already practicing a version of high impact philanthropy on her own through Kiva.org, a non-profit organization with a mission to connect people through lending to alleviate poverty. “The basic mechanics of it is you find someone who is asking for a loan to help their business or to start a business, usually in developing countries,” Jones said. “You give them a small amount of money, then other people give them money, and they eventually have enough money for their loan. They implement their business plan and then pay the money back. When you get your money back, you can loan it out again to someone else.”

Jones typically lends about $25 at a time. She has made seven loans since last year - or given about $175 - primarily to struggling artists whose stories she connected with. She lent to a woman in Pakistan who needed money for fabric, tissue paper, glue and wire to make and sell flowers. She also gave money to a man in Mexico who builds sculptures out of metal scraps and needed to purchase raw materials.

“You go to the ‘lend’ tab and it pulls up stories of people who need money for their loans,” Jones said. “You can search for something in the arts or by gender, or for an individual or a group that needs a loan. They are all vetted through Kiva, with a loan repayment rate of over 98 percent. I’ve always gotten paid back.”

“I was excited about the site because I don’t have $100 to donate to charity, and this way I have donated a small amount of money, but it keeps coming back to me so I can donate again,” Jones said. “It makes you feel good. It’s nice to think about helping others.”

Jones, who hails from Arizona, said she learned about Moore through a recruiter who came to her high school. “I like Moore because of the small community,” she said. “I went to a large high school where there were some people I had never seen before graduating next to me. I like that we are a small school. I also like that we’re in Center City. We may be an all-women’s campus, but we certainly don’t exist in a vacuum. There’s a lot going on around us.”

Victoria Lattanzi is leading the charge to turn clothing into paper for a good cause.

Under her direction, Moore College of Art & Design hosted the first-ever Peace Paper Project Workshop in Philadelphia. It consists of taking articles of clothing that hold significant meaning and turning them into paper. It is a Panty Pulping workshop, however, participants can use other articles of clothing that have significance as well.

Lattanzi is a Fine Arts major with a minor in business and textiles. She is also the recipient of the Frieda Fehrenbacher Leadership Award. For her leadership fellowship, she knew she wanted to combine her love of fine arts and fiber with art therapy.

“I knew that I was eventually looking to go into art therapy, which I plan on getting a Master’s degree in,” she said. “I came across the Peace Paper Project and thought that what they were doing – using fiber arts as social action – was absolutely perfect.”

Peace Paper Project was started in 2011 by Drew Matott and Margaret Mahan as a project that would perpetuate the art of traditional hand papermaking by bringing it to vulnerable populations across the globe. Peace Paper Project's outreach program,Panty Pulping, is embarking on a tour across the United States and Europe this summer/fall. Each stop along the way will be characterized by that community's intention to end sexual and domestic violence.

The paper making process goes like this: First, you cut up the panties or other articles of cloth into pieces. That then gets put through a Hollander beater, a machine that takes the cloth and transforms it into pulp. The pulp is then put into a large vat of water and gets drained through a mold and deckle, a type of screen that traps the fibers inside. The fibers are flipped onto a piece of felt, pressed and eventually dried into paper. If the participants want, they can do screen printing afterwards. The paper can also be bound into a book.

Some of the workshop participants will be creating journals to donate to Women Organized Against Rape (WOAR), Lattanzi said.

“I’m really excited about this whole process of paper making so as an artist it has been very fulfilling to reach out to an organization and feel so embraced by them right away,” she said. “In addition, I’m getting a lot of experience with the skills and machinery that I’m going to work with down the road. So as a student it has been very enriching. As far as leadership, I never realized the commitment and marketing and organization that factor into getting an event off the ground, so this has made me more of a leader, too.”

About Peace Paper Project: Peace Paper Project was started in 2011 by Drew Matott and Margaret Mahan as a project that would perpetuate the art of traditional hand papermaking by bringing it to vulnerable populations across the globe. Peace Paper works in collaboration with art therapists, universities, art centers, and community participants to establish systems of papermaking as self-expression and trauma intervention. Peace Paper Project practices art in the social sphere by engaging individuals with papermaking using fibers of special and personal significance. These fibers tend to relate directly to the social issues being addressed. Ultimately, Peace Paper Project is interested in the intersection of art therapy with art as social action, and uses traditional hand papermaking to facilitate this connection.http://www.peacepaperproject.org/

About Panty Pulping and the 2013 tour: This fall, Peace Paper Project's outreach program Panty Pulping will embark on a tour across the United States and Europe. Each stop along the way will be characterized by that community's intention to end sexual and domestic violence. On one level, we will be transforming underwear into paper in the public sphere as a way of combating rape culture. On another level, we will be visiting domestic abuse shelters and holding papermaking as trauma therapy workshops in collaboration with art therapists. Now more than ever presents itself as the time to demand an end to violence against women and girls, and to advocate for the global advancement of women. We at Peace Paper Project do so in our own way, utilizing traditional hand papermaking to engage communities in expressions of resilience and empowerment. http://www.pantypulping.org/

Hear from Eliza Chan '08. A Moore alumna with a BFA major in textile design, and a minor in fashion design. She's been teaching in the pre-college fashion program for over 4 years, and loves igniting students' passion for sewing and fashion design.

In May of 2014 Carlee obtained her BFA from Moore. After graduation, she was hired on part-time in Moore’s Development Office assisting with everything from the Visionary Woman Awards (a $375,000 scholarship fundraiser) to the Alumni Exhibition. In addition to working at Moore she spends twelve hours a week as a FOB Holder managing Second State Press, a professional printmaking studio. After a brief stint as a Customer Service Representative who managed the front end at an Acme market in South Philly, Carlee was also hired on as a part-time After School Lead Instructor at the Philadelphia Center for Arts and Technology (PCAT) where she continues to teach kindergarten through second graders about science, technology, engineering and math through art making and hands-on projects.

In addition to entering the workforce full-time, she has continued to use art making as a Way or Do in the studio. The author of The Japanese Way of the Artist, H.E. Davey, describes a Do as “an art that allows us to understand the ultimate nature of the whole of life by closely examining ourselves through a singular activity of life: to arrive at the universal through studying the particular.” With this idea in mind, Carlee explores techniques involving one primary material--wood; with this material, she explores techniques such as woodblock printmaking, wood burning, and installation with a painstakingly slow hand allowing each process to become meditative in nature. To view some examples of her work visit her website at: www.carleemyers.com

Even though she was in the U.S. Air Force for six years, Rinda Edelman always knew she wanted to be an artist.

Originally from Colorado, Edelman’s mother was in the U.S. Army. When she retired, they moved to Hawaii, where Edelman graduated from high school and eventually joined the Air Force.

“I’ve always loved art,” she said. “Unfortunately there was not a lot of employment in Hawaii. Joining the Air Force kind of detoured me, but as soon as I got out I knew I wanted to do something in the art field.”

Today, Edelman, 30, is living her dream, enrolled as a graphic design major at Moore. She transferred to the College last fall from Delaware Technical & Community College in Dover, Delaware, where her husband Michael is stationed in the Air Force. The couple have two young children.

“I originally started out as an interior design major at Del Tech but took a color and composition class and fell in love with it,” she said. “So I switched my major to ad design. It goes hand in hand with the graphic design program here at Moore.”

Edelman came to Moore after two of her professors at Del Tech – Joyce Newcomb and Donna Felton – encouraged her to visit the campus and take a tour.

“I came to Moore and really fell in love with the atmosphere and the environment,” she said. “I absolutely love my classes and especially enjoyed a book arts class my first semester. It really opened me up to new things I hadn’t done before, which is another thing I love about the classes here.”

Even though she’s a few years older than most of the students at Moore, Edelman said she never feels out of place because everyone is friendly.

“I’ve met a couple of students my age,” she said. “I feel like everyone at Moore is very talented so the age gap doesn’t really factor in.”

Commuting from Dover each day for classes can be difficult, but Edelman said her husband is very supportive of her decision to go back to school. And they get help from family and friends.

“My husband was deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan several times in the past,” she said. “I was in the military for two of his deployments. It was very hard. But we had lots of help from co-workers. Now that we’re in Delaware it’s easier because we have family in Pennsylvania.”

When she’s not busy with her studies, Edelman works on her website on ETSY, where she sells decals (wall graphics) and hopes to eventually have her own design business. She said she learned discipline and time management during her time in the Air Force, skills that have been helpful when it comes to her work at Moore.

Moore College of Art & Design alumna Dom Streater ’10 joined the ranks of the ascending fashion elite when she was named the winner of Project Runway Season 12.

Streater, from West Philadelphia, bested three other designer finalists to take the title following the debut of her “Retro Redux” collection at New York Fashion Week. Streater spoke to students at Moore’s 2013 Leadership Conference for Women in the Arts.

“I’ve never experienced anything close to this feeling before in my life,” Streater said after the win. “It’s a huge deal for me. This will change everything.”

She takes home bragging rights and a prize estimated to be worth more than half a million dollars.

Streater, who graduated from Moore in 2010 with a BFA in Fashion Design, said she was overwhelmed by the support from the Moore community since returning home from filming. She was a judge at Moore’s Jump/Start Fashion Show on October 1, where she was flooded by students who wanted to meet her and get her autograph.

“It’s all about Moore girls sticking together,” she said. “Because it’s an all women’s college, that bond sticks even after graduation.”

Streater said that all the textile classes she took at Moore gave her an edge over the other designers on the show. She was one of the few designers who embraced print and textile design. This helped her in Episode 11, when she won the HP Intel textile design challenge and ultimately, led to her win.

“The fashion program at Moore was great,” she said. “Everything I know how to do is because I went to Moore, in terms of construction and how I think about design. I learned to be very methodical and precise when I’m working. It helped me a lot on the show.”

Before making it big on TV, Streater was busy designing her own clothing and accessories line, Halcyon Collection. She’s currently working on her fall/winter collection for 2014. In the meantime, thanks to the show, the orders are coming in fast and furiously.

“I’ve gotten so many requests for designs and dresses,” she said. “I literally can’t make things fast enough. People want to look like a ‘Dom’ girl.”

Hear from Lydia Knopp, a Graphic Design and Curatorial Studies Junior, at Moore College of Art & Design. Learn about her experience with coming right out of a public, co-ed school in Kansas, and going to a private, all-women's art college in Philly, (0:06) specifically experiencing the all-women academic environment, (0:36) the value of the opportunities she's had at Moore, (1:05) going out and experiencing a city with over 300,000 other college students (1:17) the challenge a double major has in choosing her internship, (1:58) moving to Philly and finding her way through Mural Arts murals, (2:28) experiencing an internship on the west coast, and how her travels are creating a more well-rounded artist and person, (2:38) Moore is... (2:55)

Enthusiast by Tours is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License.

Hear from Lydia Knopp, a Graphic Design and Curatorial Studies Junior, at Moore College of Art & Design. Learn about her experience with Moore's Emerging Leaders in the Arts program, and her volunteership with the City of Philadelphia Mural Arts Program, (0:09) her mentorship at Atria Senior Living and her experiences helping with her Grandmother Milly, (0:26) helping her adopted grandparents engage life and navigate some essential computer skills, (1:06) volunteering at Atria for the Martin Luther King Jr. Day of Service, (1:20) helping with the Creative Aging Process with Art, (1:35) a full 3D Graphic Design Branding project for her "Milly's Croatian Sensations", (2:04) Moore is... (3:16)

SPECIAL THANKS TO: Atria Senior Living

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The junior Fashion Design major has a 3.9 grade point average, is the recipient of two recent scholarships/fellowships and has been offered her pick of summer internships.

Next year, she’ll be the first in her family to graduate with a Bachelor’s degree.

“It’s going to feel great,” she said. “My family is really proud of me. I can’t wait to graduate and start my career.”

Born in Kenya, one of seven siblings, Oluoch was the first to migrate to the United States to pursue her dream of being a fashion designer. In 2000 she arrived in Baltimore, where she attended Baltimore Community College for Computer Aided Design (CAD). She then moved to Virginia to work for a loan company for several years. The company relocated to Delaware, where Oluoch started a family, eventually moving to Philadelphia to pursue her dream of fashion.

After a short stint at the Art Institute in Philadelphia, Oluoch, a non-traditional aged student, transferred to Moore. The rest, she said, was history.

“Moore is family,” she said. “Because I don’t have family here, I’ve met people who I’ll keep in my life forever. It’s amazing how much people really, sincerely care here. Because of how I push myself, I’ve really seen myself grow from when I started.”

At Honors Convocation last week, Oluoch received the Sis Grenald Travel Fellowship and The Fashion Group International/Libby Haynes Hyman Endowed Scholarship. For her travel fellowship, she plans to visit London to gain experience fusing fashion and sculpture alongside artist Yinka Shinobare.

Oluoch will also travel to South Africa for her summer internship with design labels David Tlale and Leopard Frock.

Before that, she’ll be showing her swimwear and menswear looks at Moore’s Spring Fashion Show on May 17, 2014.

Oluoch admits it can be difficult to balance being a full-time student at Moore, working part-time (as a gallery guide and visitor service assistant at the Barnes Foundation), and being a mom to her 5-year-old son, Alexander. But it’s all worth it, she said.

“Sometimes I get overwhelmed, but then I look at my son and realize I’m going to be able to provide him with everything he needs one day,” she said. “I just want him to grow up into a great man someday.”

So when the opportunity presented itself for the junior Fashion Design student to work in the costume department for Terror Behind the Walls, the Penitentiary’s famous Halloween haunted house, the decision was a no-brainer.

“The head of the costume department wanted to expand because they only had two people, so because of my interest in costume design they added an additional person,” Miller said. “Now I’m the assistant costume designer. My future goal is to do costume design for film, so this is a great first step.”

As a student in Moore’s Business Scholars in the Arts program, Miller was recently able to shadow an alumna in her field for a day on the job. Miller connected with Alexa O’Neill ’12, a freelance costume designer, and helped her style a music video. O’Neill had worked at Eastern State Penitentiary and suggested that Miller check it out.

Eastern State Penitentiary was once the most famous and expensive prison in the world, but today stands in ruin on Fairmount Avenue, a haunting world of crumbling cellblocks and empty guard towers. Besides daytime prison tours, the Penitentiary is known for Terror Behind the Walls, a massive nighttime haunted house in the abandoned prison. The extraordinary theatrical production runs on select evenings from September 19 through November 8, 2014.

Terror Behind the Walls hires more than 200 performers, outfitting them in the creepiest costumes to scare visitors who tour the haunted house. As part of that effort, Miller works one day a week in the Costume Shop, fitting costumes, maintaining props, making sure each actor has the right costume, mending any tears, sewing costumes and sometimes creating a whole new costume.

“It’s a team effort,” she said. “We constantly hear of people being really impressed with the costumes, though. They are considered ‘Hollywood quality.’”

Although she has always been a big “Halloween person,” Miller said most people have a misconception that costume designers make the best Halloween costumes. “Most of us don’t have the time to make them for ourselves, so I haven’t had a good one in a long time.”

Miller said she has been fascinated by the history of Eastern State Penitentiary for years, since she first visited in 2012.

“It has that cool, creepy vibe to it,” she said. “I’m also excited to be working there because Terror Behind the Walls is doing something very innovative – giving patrons the option for a more extreme experience.”

When you enter Terror Behind the Walls, you will be confronted with a critical decision: should you explore the prison and watch the action, or should you mark yourself to truly interact with the denizens of the cellblocks? Those who opt in for true interactivity may be grabbed, held back, sent into hidden passageways, removed from their group and occasionally incorporated into the show. For 2014, Terror Behind the Walls has also unveiled the most interactive attraction in the history of the event – the Machine Shop.

Miller likes that her costume work plays a role in the overall experience of Terror Behind the Walls. She credits the BSA program for helping her get the seasonal job of her dreams.

“The Career Center strongly encouraged me to do the shadow day and also helped me perfect my resume,” she said. “At my interview (at the Penitentiary), they complimented me on my resume and hired me on the spot.”

The BSA program is for transfer students with an entrepreneurial bent. Miller transferred to Moore from Carroll County Community College, where she earned an Associate’s degree in Fine Arts.

“Carroll County did not have a fashion program,” she said. “I wanted to come to a small college and I really liked the idea that Moore was an all girl’s college and it seemed very focused. I didn’t want to end up in a big university where I’d feel like just a number. When I received the information in the mail from Moore, my mom said ‘if someone made a school just for you it would be Moore.’”

“I'm Shemir from Philly. The W.W Smith Scholarship means a lot to me. When I was in Middle School I had to undergo surgery because of a cyst within my abdomen. Once they found that out I had to go into immediate surgery. After the surgery, probably about four months, I had to go to surgery again because they found more on my ovaries. They had to take out one of my ovaries and half of the other ovary. Probably a couple months after that, I got a phone call and they said, ‘Hey, Shemir, you need to have chemotherapy because there was a cancerous cell that we found in your body.’

I had to undergo chemotherapy for a couple of months afterwards. After that, my mom was bombarded with dose after dose after dose because of the medical situations from MRIs, CAT scans, et cetera, et cetera. She has four kids, which means three younger siblings. She's a single parent.

I definitely wanted to go to Moore, but I didn't have enough money. Once I found out about the scholarship, they said, ‘Hey Shemir, why don't you apply for this scholarship?’ That was perfect because it was the perfect amount I needed to come to the school. Once I found out about that, I wrote my letter, told my story, and come to find out, I received the scholarship. It was amazing!

This is my first year at Moore - I plan to do Interior Design next year. I’m so excited - I can't even talk about it! Moore is definitely a family. Before I was even accepted, probably the second event I went to, they knew my name and knew what I was interested in, everything. From the start, I just knew this was the place that I needed to be. I couldn't imagine myself really anywhere else.”

“I came to Moore around eighteen, typical college age. I initially came for Fashion Design and then ended up changing my major. I ended up in Fine Arts and after about six months, Illustration. I wanted to do everything. I was doing well and around, I would say, when my junior year, my little brother got sick. He had a brain tumor. It formed around his pituitary gland; it's a really long name that I can't pronounce. I tried to hold my own - my parents were at the Ronald McDonald house so I couldn't just quit and go home. I'm a very determined spirit and I'm very stubborn. I was like, ‘I'm going to get through this. I'm going to do this.’

Ultimately, things got really heavy. I had to go to New York twice a week - he was NYU Medical. Of course, it was Thanksgiving, because bad things always happen on holidays. I don't know why that works out that way. Everything was just very chaotic. I had to get a job, pay rent, grow very fast. I was nineteen/twenty, so I was supposed to start working on growing up, but I was just thrown into it as opposed to other people at that age who get a chance to do it gradually. My grades started to slip, so I decided maybe it was the right thing to do - to part ways with Moore with intentions of coming back within a year or so.

I had to work a little harder, things got busy. Then I actually started working in the curatorial field by accident. I applied to show my artwork at a gallery then later the owner brought me on as an assistant and then two months later I was director of the gallery. Then I started founding things. I founded an arts fair called Art in the Dark where I didn't take any money from the artists, but I would turn these bars into mini art galleries for a night. I was doing all this stuff that was in my field on top of showing my art work with what I got from Moore.

It was like five or six years later. I started thinking about coming back to school just to continue what I was doing and decided that I should go back to school and finish what I started. It just felt like the right time: my brother was in the clear, everyone was re-situating themselves family wise, friends wise, life wise. Everything was working itself back into place and then when I started doing my research to finish my undergrad, I found that Moore had a Curatorial program, which is great because that means I wouldn't have had to start over. I'm thirty-one now. At that point I was twenty-eight, twenty-nine.

Getting that piece of paper with Curatorial Studies on it is really going to push me forward. And now the Business Minor, so I'm getting a little more business savvy and I'm really going to turn my creative spirit into an entrepreneurial spirit. I want to open my own space and now I feel like I have the tools to do so.

I was introduced to the W. W. Smith scholarship by Devon in the Financial Aid office. It was great! It covered the balance that I had left to be able to get back to Moore. It is going to help me to achieve the goal that I've been working on slowly for this extended amount of time. I just feel like I've been sky-rocketed into the right direction!”

SAMANTHA SIERMINE: IN HER OWN WORDS
A Shirley Vernon Scholarship recipient

“I'm Sam Siermine, a Graphic Design major in my junior year. I have three siblings and with my mom being disabled it was tough when it came to money. The Shirley Vernon Scholarship I received really helped us to pay for my education and I was really lucky to get it. The scholarship helped me to continue my work here at Moore because with such a large family and my mom not being able to work, it was difficult for me to have money to commute or buy the supplies I needed for class.

I'm glad that I went to Moore because I'm happy that they were able to give me this scholarship, as well as for the classes. The classes are great because they're small and I get a lot of one-on-one time with my professors. Dorothy Funderwhite and Gigi (McGee) are two of my professors that I have for most of my classes and they have been really helpful. They have helped me grow as a graphic designer. The girls in the class are very supportive and always give their insight. They're always polite about it, too. I learn a lot from my classmates as well as my teachers.

In Graphic Design three, we actually worked with the Mann Music Center to create a brand identity for their festival Liberty Unplugged. It was a contest, so they picked what they liked the best to use for branding Liberty Unplugged. They would offer a summer internship and use our brand identity. They actually picked me for that. That's the internship I'm going to start this summer and it's really exciting because it's my work getting used. It will be a great experience!”

An excerpt from a February 4, 2015 interview
Photo by Macy Zhelyazkova

At age 51, Kate Leigh Cutler ’91, Interior Design, graduated Moore and was ready to take on the world.

Thirty years prior to attending Moore, after taking some college classes, Cutler started a flower design business creating arrangements for weddings, centerpieces -- even competing in national competitions.

Her arrangements caught the eye of a friend who worked in the marketing department at Lenox Corporation, a market leader in quality tabletop, giftware and collectibles. Cutler was invited to design the Lenox Colonial Christmas Wreath Plate series from 1981 - 1993. Each plate’s design included a Christmas wreath made with natural materials that were native to the 13 original colonies. Moore has enjoyed a longtime relationship with Lenox, who has hired many Moore students to serve as professional designers and design interns.

“It really floated my boat for a time,” Cutler said. But after reading the best-selling book What Color Is My Parachute by Richard Nelson Bolles -- a practical manual for job hunters and career seekers -- she realized that interior design was her true passion. She decided to go back to school to complete her bachelor’s degree and enrolled at Moore.

Cutler said she chose Moore because she found the all-women environment to be appealing, comfortable and attractive.

Though she didn’t fit the demographics of a typical college student, she connected easily with the students in her classes.

“I loved every minute of it,” Cutler said. Though she majored in Interior Design, she quickly discovered her voice as a fine artist after taking a few classes and getting positive feedback from faculty.

After graduating with her Interior Design degree, Cutler took freelance work to pay the bills. She also started pursuing her passion – mainly painting watercolors of interiors and exteriors of homes out of her garage.

One of her freelance projects involved doing watercolor pieces for Continental Airlines. She also helped design invitations for inaugural flights (when new airplanes fly) and lectured at conferences about how to incorporate art in the engineering environment. She ended up freelancing for Continental for five years.

“My art and my Moore training really came together,” Cutler said.

Today, Cutler is a full-time painter. She paints emotionally-charged waterscapes from her home studio in Bayhead, NJ and keeps busy teaching art classes, exhibiting her work, entering competitions and doing private commissions. She recently donated a painting of a local historic boat at an auction to restore her church. The painting, which sold for $10,000, is now hanging in the church.

With a busy year behind her, future projects are on hold for a moment as Cutler re-organizes her studio, but this doesn’t mean she will slow down. She is asked all the time how she manages to do it all and her response is the same: “It’s exhilarating. It’s my life. It’s probably more overwhelming if one sees it written down, but I am better under pressure and if I have a goal or purpose.”

Justine Yeagle ‘09 Interior Design, leaves her creative imprint all over the world.

As a project manager at Tricarico Architecture and Design PC, an architecture and design firm in northern New Jersey, Yeagle works with major retailers on high-profile projects across America and most recently in Amsterdam in the Netherlands. The company specializes in Specialty Retail, Corporate Interiors, Automotive, Commercial, Beauty & Wellness and Hospitality & Restaurants.

Yeagle’s favorite project in her three and a half years on the job is the Robert Graham store at NorthPark Mall in Dallas, Texas. There, she collaborated with her best friend and co-worker in creating new merchandise fixtures for the store. The client wanted to represent Texas without the cliched “cowboy” feel. Yeagle and her partner researched the state’s history and drew inspiration from there. The pair combined elements from the state’s slogan, “Rising Star,” Dallas’ Six Flags theme park and oil rigs to create the fixtures.

“My favorite part of working in retail is seeing how the fixtures and merchandise define a space,” Yeagle said.

She credits Margaret Leahy, former faculty member in Interior Design, for running a “fantastic” program that developed the conceptual design skills she uses every day. She does have one regret -- she wishes she had taken the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) course. Her advice to students: “Do not pass up an opportunity to better yourself.”

Yeagle said her AutoCAD skills, honed at Moore, helped her land three internships. While a student at Moore, Yeagle interned at John Kelly Interior Design in Philadelphia and continued the internship for about a year after graduation and the summer before her senior year, Yeagle also interned at TJD Architects in Bridgeton, New Jersey. The summer after graduation, Yeagle interned at AC Moore in Berlin, New Jersey, which eventually led to her first job. She was later recruited to join Tricarico from her former boss at AC Moore.

Carrie Morrissey ‘04 Fashion Design, hasn’t slept in days. That’s because she is gearing up for Market Week, the week after New York Fashion Week in February where she will be presenting her jewelry collection.

Morrissey is the owner and designer behind I Still Love You NYC (ISLYNYC), a jewelry line that is garnering international attention. Her hand-crafted acrylic pieces can be seen everywhere from the pages of Vogue and other magazines to gracing the bodies of recording artists Iggy Azalea and Meghan Trainor.

Morrissey has shown at New York Fashion Week in the past, collaborating with DKNY. Many of ISLY’s pieces are designed to match DKNY’s line, or are re-purposed to do so. She is currently working on her own collection, “BARBIE DYSMORPHIA,” featuring around 60 new pieces of jewelry, visors and belts for Market Week, the main wholesale purchasing time of each season following Fashion Week.

In 2014, DKNY learned of ISLY through International Playground, a showroom in Soho that handles sales for ISLY. The fashion director at DKNY contacted Morrissey suggesting a co-brand collaboration. She could barely contain her excitement.

“I read the email on my phone and threw the phone across the room I was so excited,” she said. Still, Morrissey remains humble, designing and cutting each individual piece of jewelry with her laser cutter. It was only a year and a half ago when she invited eight people over to her apartment, including her mother, to help fulfill a thousand-piece order. Now, she has a new studio space, has hired a full-time production assistant and still finds it “trippy” when people show interest in her work.

ISLYNYC is now sold in all of the DKNY flagship stores at seven locations in the United States and two in the United Kingdom. One can also find ISLY merchandise in boutique shops in New York City, such as Patricia Field and International Playground, as well as domestically in Nordstrom's and Nasty Gal. Morrissey also has a large fan base internationally.

Morrissey graduated from Moore in 2004 with a BFA in Fashion Design. She worked several jobs in the industry while in Philadelphia. After moving to New York City, she was hired as a Web Product Data Management Specialist at Fishman and Tobin Inc., a kidswear brand specialist. But the corporate world wasn’t fulfilling her creative needs, which kept her up late at night creating things. Morrissey decided to follow her heart. She created ISLYNYC in 2010 as a clothing line. It wasn’t until 2013 that ISLY was noticed for its laser- cut acrylic jewelry. By 2013, ISLY phased out clothing to focus solely on jewelry.

Morrissey is currently positioning herself to work more with celebrity stylists and wants to be “the brand choice” for custom pieces. A pair of ISLY “sports icon earrings,” one of Morrissey’s favorite pieces, have been worn by actress Shay Mitchell and have been featured in numerous magazines. Another pair of ISLY earrings are featured on a back-up dancer in Beyonce’s new music video for her song, “7/11.”

ISLY’s jewelry is fun, bold, and pushes boundaries. Morrissey believes that ISLY also sets itself apart because of her fashion background, which allows her pieces to be more “conceptual and esoteric.”

Morrissey said she gained a solid knowledge of the fashion industry through studio design classes at Moore that prepared her for three different internships and her career. Morrissey is a firm believer that one should be in the industry for a while before branching out independently. It wasn’t until years later that she took business classes at the Fashion Institute of Technology, where she learned how to create a business plan.

Morrissey credits Moore not only for preparing her for the fashion industry but for something that has proven to be just as empowering -- the relationships she built with other Moore graduates. “I really loved that Moore was a girls school,” she said, “It was something I didn’t think I’d be that in to at first, but I forged some of the best friendships. It’s thrilling to watch your friends succeed and it’s something that has always made me really happy.”

Morrissey plans to attend Moore’s 2015 Spring Fashion Show, An Evening at the Barnes, to be held on Saturday, May 16 at 8 pm at The Barnes Foundation. One of her interns, Tanya Murray, will be showing her senior collection. Visit here to learn more about the fashion show and to purchase tickets.

Hear from Brianna Boulanger, a Graphic Design major, about Moore's personalized class experience, the College’s tight-knit community, and her internship with Campbell's as well as all the great projects she worked on while there. She tells of how Campbell’s provided an invaluable real-world experience gained as a result of Moore's unique, paid internship program.

Illustration major Blakely Inberg talks about how the Jane Walentas Travel Fellowship allowed for her to travel to Seoul, Korea and Tokyo, Japan and explore the anime and cartoon culture of those cities. She then expands upon the impact those experiences have had on her work and the plans she has for her senior thesis.

When she was a girl, Clarissa Todd started making art when she was bored in church while her father preached. “I would sit in the church pew and just take out a sketchbook and create some art work,” she said. “At the end of the sermon, I would show my mom and next thing you know, I'm sitting at home with a sketchbook, but it all started from sketching inside the church” Now, Todd is a candidate in Graduate Studies at Moore’s MA in Art Education with An Emphasis in Special Populations. In this video you’ll hear Clarissa talk about her teaching philosophy and her experiences at Moore and student teaching at Bala Cynwyd Middle School (BCMS), as well as from BCMS students and teacher Beverly Rusoff.

As a practicing artist, it's important to keep one's work fresh, which allows me to keep my teaching fresh. My own work combines my interests in photography, architecture, surveillance, computer automation and domestic space. A recent grant from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts allowed me to take up a summer residency at the Bemis Center for Contemporary Arts in Omaha, Nebraska. There I was able to create artwork on a much larger scale, with significantly greater technological and conceptual intricacies than I have done before.

After receiving my BFA from Marywood University I received my MFA from Rochester Institute of Technology. For a while I studied in Florence, at the Studio Art Centers. So I've gone from Delhi, NY, where I grew up, to Scranton, PA, to Rochester, NY, to Florence, Italy and now I'm here in Philadelphia teaching at Moore. I couldn't be happier. This town has this incredible arts scene. I just joined Vox Populi. It's only the beginning.

I choose the MFA in Studio Art Program at Moore for several reasons: 1) it's low residency was perfect as an older person and a single mom, it allowed me the space to still meet my family obligations while pursuing my studies and 2) I have been interested in Moore since I was about nine years old.

My studio practice thanks to Moore is wide open. I used to try and define myself as a specific type of artist and would get upset with myself because I would want to do other things, like I like to paint but I would want to do a project that was all photos or fiber. Now I define myself as and simply and artist and I have given my self permission to use and explore what ever media and material that is appropriate for the project and the statement that I am making.

Life inspires me; people, places, music!

Moore's MFA in Studio Art program has influenced my practice by giving me a greater understanding and appreciation of what it means to be a practicing artist today. It has opened my eyes to the many possibilities available to us.

Some thing unique about me, besides the fact that I'm the Chello and I tell people on a regular basis that I'm Budda and that I know everything (that's what I tell my kids) I am 52, I think I am the senior student in the MFA in Studio Art program. I did not start down the road to being an artist until I was 48 and a junior I switched my major from social work to studio art and shocked the living day lights out of pretty much everyone who knew me. I did love art when I was younger but I got thrown out of my high school art room from making an army of clay man parts. Also I went to college with my oldest daughter and even had some classes with her that was cool.

I am a survivor of some pretty gross domestic violence I am just getting to the point were I am addressing that with my art work. Speaking of surviving I am also a three time cancer survivor and an MS patient who was told eight years ago that I would be in a wheel chair in three months, that didn't happen and I don't plan on letting it happen. My children will tell you that yes I am very stubborn and I really don't know when to give up, it's just not in my vocabulary.

After graduation I would like to teach on a college level and perhaps keep going to earn my PhD and possible both while of course making, making, making art.

The Burren residency was awesome, I did mine this past summer and it was truly amazing. I felt like I became and artist there because I was able to let go of my self imposed notions of how art was supposed to happened and just create.

I visited COOL (Career Opportunities On-Line) and
was looking for an internship that was within walking distance. I found Sneaker
Villa, a small company with a wide range of things that I could learn about or
do. They do performance footwear and urban apparel. They carry brands such as
Nike, Jordon, Timberland, and Adidas.

Sneaker Villa was founded in 1989 and was a family-run business. They have 69 locations
and another 10 more slated to open by Christmas. They serve five markets –
Philadelphia, West New York, Cleveland, Detroit and Chicago. They opened two
stores, one in Pennsylvania and another in Chicago, IL, during my internship.
This allowed me to work on window graphics and other promotional graphics.

I learned how projects were
executed for the market and the store and how it follows through from concept
to product. I liked the internship at Sneaker Villa. I’ve enjoyed my experience
here so far.

Moore faculty member and muralist David Guinn’s artwork can be seen all over Philadelphia and as far away as Jordan.

Guinn, a Moore faculty member and artist based in Philadelphia, has painted over 30 large scale public murals since 1998 throughout the city, as well as in New York City, Washington, DC. and Montreal, Canada.

His work has been noted in books, newspapers, magazines and on television and radio, including TheNew York Times, Wall Street Journal and Spin magazine. His smaller scale paintings have been shown in galleries and museums, including The Fabric Workshop and Museum, the Woodmere Art Museum and The Galleries at Moore.

Guinn is the recipient of numerous awards and grants, including the prestigious Knight Arts Challenge 2013, an Independence Foundation Fellowship and a Mid-Atlantic Arts Foundation Fellowship in the Arts.

Guinn has been an adjunct professor in Fine Arts at Moore since 2011. In the past, he has taught Mural Painting and Advanced Painting. He has also taught at Philadelphia Mural Arts and been a guest lecturer at the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia University, the University of the Arts and Johnson State College in Vermont. In 2012, Guinn founded Freewall, an outdoor space at 1214 Sansom Street in Philadelphia, dedicated to promoting innovative mural art.

A graduate of Columbia University, Guinn was originally trained as an architect, mainly in pursuit of a more practical career path. But shortly after graduating in 1994, he moved back to Philadelphia and saw what the Mural Arts Program was doing – and that changed his career path. “I was excited and saw it [mural painting] as an intersection of painting and architecture where you could work in a public space and work at an architectural scale, but have some of the structure and accountability of a traditional job.” Guinn said. “It also had this creative freedom that painting gives you.”

Guinn sought out opportunities for work, connecting with a friend who did faux finishing and interior murals in people’s homes. The friend was commissioned to create a mural through the Mural Arts Program and asked Guinn to assist.

“Through him, I met Jane Golden [Executive Director of the Mural Arts Program] and I said, ‘this is really what I want to do’,” he said. “I liked the public nature and there was even more freedom to have a more personal voice in the Mural Arts Program.”

Guinn got his start as an assistant with several different artists. But he got his big break when an artist dropped out of a mural project at 10th and Bainbridge, a high-profile commission. Golden asked him to take over the project.

“She knew that the subject matter that I was interested in - architectural, cityscapes, would fit at this site,” he said. “And because that project was a success and had a lot of visibility, they continued to offer me more projects.”

Guinn recently completed a mural on the side of a house at 4th and Manton Streets next to the Manton Street Community Garden. The mural was dedicated on November 15, 2014. He is also painting a mural on fabric in his studio to be installed in the Spring on the wall above the Shake Shack on 20th and Sansom Streets. This year, he even painted a mural in Amman, Jordan.

“There was a mural festival there where they invited eight international muralists and Jordanian artists,” Guinn said. “The festival was two weeks and painting was eight days. The best part was they had Jordanian college students work on the mural with me and there was a great cultural exchange.”

Guinn said the murals that best suit him are those done by a small group of people, where you can get close enough to appreciate the details but also see the big picture from a distance. The largest mural he ever painted was about 200 feet long and 30 feet high. About 1,000 square feet is a typical mural. Depending on the project, it can take two weeks to two months to complete a mural.

“My murals usually have some type of landscape reference , but I’m going for creating a space for the passerby to enter in their mind and find a restful, contemplative space, somewhere they can go into and explore,” he said.

Guinn said he is lucky to be able to make a living doing what he loves, while teaching on the side.

“There’s something really thrilling about making this big painting outside,” he said. “It’s pretty social and you meet a lot of people. You’re always at a new place. You never know what’s going to happen on any given day. It’s exciting when you get into the zone and you’re seeing this big artwork come together. It can also be stressful in the beginning because you’re performing on some level, working outside, and you have to pull it off. It’s exhilarating but terrifying.”

Of all of his projects, Guinn said he’s most proud of the mural he created in 2010 on Locust Street between 11th and 12th Streets in a community garden called Sartain Garden, near where he grew up.

“The theme of the spirit of community gardening came together really well,” he said. “It was an advancement in my technique and I was able to bring in the feeling- the movement and spontaneity- of the watercolor paintings I was making in the studio, into my mural work. It was an exciting time."

Guinn said he is continually excited by the growing number of muralists in Philadelphia, a city with more public murals than anywhere in the world. He often involves students and former students in the work as assistants on mural projects, from preparing the wall with primer and a grid to drawing and painting, to helping organize community events.

These are all words to describe Ben Panter. And he credits Moore’s MFA in Studio Art program with helping to make these dreams a reality.

Panter graduated from the Studio Art program in 2012. He is currently an adjunct professor teaching darkroom photography at Burlington County College in New Jersey.

Previously, he taught at Camden County College while also working at the Camden County Cultural and Heritage Commission as curator of their gallery space. He spent this past year as an artist-in-residence for the Rutgers-Camden Center for the Arts.

“For six weeks I spent a couple of days a week in one of the Camden elementary or junior high schools doing photography arts projects with the students,” he said. “It was a really great experience and I hope to do it again.”
For his day job, Panter works at his church in Mount Laurel, NJ, doing graphics, web and video projects. He has an undergraduate degree in Art from Rutgers-Camden, but was just a few classes short of a design degree and has continued to develop his skill set.

He recently exhibited his art work at the Mount Laurel Library.

“They gave me an open wall and said to put up any work that I had,” he said. “A lot of the work I’d done while at Moore and in the past year or so. I’ve done things as far as printing, video and alternative processes, but a lot of my work is at photography based.”
Panter said he was attracted to the small, intimate nature of Moore’s graduate program. As one of five students in his class, he had the opportunity to be individually mentored, both by professors and other professional artists during his thesis year.

“Every professor I felt like I could call if I had a question,” he said. “They all offered to assist us in any way possible after graduation. It gave us that circle we could tap into whenever we needed it.”

He was mentored by Fred Herr, an artist who teaches at Camden County College. Through that connection, he ended up getting the teaching job there.

“He (Fred) was able to help me with my work and professionally,” he said.

Panter said he also learned how to teach by observing his own teachers and taking notes.
“Since teaching is something I’m pursuing at the higher education level, to me that was really invaluable,” he said. “I was able to figure out other people’s methods. I think for the 20-some people we had as teachers and mentors throughout the program, each of them had their own way of interacting with us as artists. You have to be able to do that to approach your students differently in the classroom.”

A six-week summer residency in The Burren, Ireland was an invaluable experience for Panter. Because of it, he decided to do another residency this past summer at Artscape Gibraltar Point in Toronto, Ontario. He shared a studio and made art with another student from his graduating class.

As part of his recent residency, Panter ran a successful Kickstarter campaign to fund the cyanotype project he went there to complete -- to create a new series of large format cyanotype photographic images.

After graduating from Moore in May 2013, I continued living in Philly for about a year. During this time I received a hand block printing position at Galbraith and Paul in Manayunk, PA. I began working there in July of 2013 and have been there for over a year now, as I am currently there as handblock printer/artisan. I print fabric yardage (linens, velvet and oyster are our grounds). The yardage that we (there are about 10 artisans) print is then used for upholstery, pillows, window treatments, etc. Galbraith and Paul has several showrooms around the world, with our sole studio being located in Manayunk.

During this time, I also became engaged and this past July (2014) married my best friend and the love of my life. My husband and I are currently living in West Chester, Pa where I have a small space to continue working on my own personal work. Graduating as a Fine Arts:2D Major with a Textile Minor, I still have a huge interest in painting and printmaking. I am currently experimenting with new processes involving layering techniques that will lend itself to work that is on a much smaller scale than I have done before.

Hear from Megan Means, a recent fine arts alum at Moore College of Art & Design. Learn about her experience choosing Moore's all-women BFA program, (0:04) how Philadelphia and her Sarah Peter Travel Fellowship informed her Senior Thesis, (0:50) her two summer Internships at Harshita Designs in Yardley PA, and The Center For Emerging Visual Artists in Philadelphia (1:42) and the value of living on and off Moore's campus. (2:27)

Special thanks to:
Harshita Designs, where you will find uniquely designed wearable art for women and men,including scarves, shawls, handbags, jewelry, tunics and jackets. www.harshitadesigns.com

The Center For Emerging Visual Artists dedicates itself to making art careers viable for those who choose them, helping emerging artists reach their audiences, and promoting interest and understanding of emerging visual art among citizens of the community. www.cfeva.org

I was a fine arts major at Moore, which really prepared me for my career. My classes gave me the hands-on experience necessary for me to become the artist I am today.

Since I graduated, I’ve designed and created more than 30 large-scale public works nationally and internationally. My achievements include being named a fellow of the National Association of Latino Arts and Culture Fund for the Arts (2011), receiving a Leeway Foundation Transformation Award (2008), and being awarded a Leeway Foundation Art & Change Grant (2005).

As an arts educator, I use the arts as a tool for communication to bridge communities. Since 2008, I’ve led international artist residencies through the US Embassy and trained local artists in public art techniques in Juarez and Chihuahua City, Mexico and Suva, Fiji.

I’m excited and honored to be the Commencement Speaker for Moore’s class of 2012. It’s my chance to give back to Moore and share my experiences to help influence the next generation of artists.

Kopko, the store manager for a year, is working on a long-range project to transform the shop into a unique hybrid of museum exhibition and boutique.

“It’s an idea created via the array of different jobs I’ve had that have crossed between museums, galleries and big-box retail,” she said. “The mix of artwork calls for a creative method of displaying work and allowing each piece to have its space to shine.”

The Art Shop, a fixture at the College since 2002, is the only permanent shop in Philadelphia to sell student and alumni work from all majors. The shop offers a variety of one-of-a-kind artwork -- from ceramics and jewelry to hand-made greeting cards and wall art -- and of course, Moore merchandise. Prices range from $2 to $2,000.

The goal of The Art Shop is to give students and alumnae of all ages the opportunity (sometimes their first opportunity) to present and sell their work to the public. The art and design pieces are created by Moore’s emerging and established alumnae as well as current students. Local artists of note include Harshita Lohia ’02, a textile designer, Kelly Kozma ’10, a mixed-media artist and Heather Bryson ’02, a jeweler and gallery owner.

“I really like promoting artists and their work,” Kopko said. “And this job was a great way to come back to Moore and give back. It really seems like a culmination of my previous experience.”

As part of her plan to rejuvenate The Art Shop, Kopko has painted the walls and purchased new display cases. New artwork arrives weekly. Kopko re-arranges and changes out work regularly to keep the look fresh.

“I’m trying to promote the whole idea that if you see it today you should buy it today, because it may not be in shop next week,” she said. “When selecting work, the space available, the customers’ buying preferences as well as including a range of style has to be considered.”

Her efforts to curate the shop seem to be working, with a 30 percent increase in sales this fiscal year over last year.

Kopko graduated from Moore in 1993 with a BFA degree in Fashion Design. While a student at Moore, she worked in costume and wardrobe for the Philadelphia Theater Company and did summer stock at the Berkshire Theater Festival.

“I realized I had no desire to go Seventh Avenue and have a career in fashion,” she said. “I liked having more hands-on jobs. I wanted to create things, rather than work in corporate fashion.”

When her husband’s job relocated the couple to Atlanta, GA, Kopko began a museum career as Assistant and Volunteer Coordinator for the Center for Puppetry Arts. There, she planned and installed exhibitions and was responsible for visitor services.

She returned to Philadelphia in 2002 to get her Master of Arts degree in Museum Education and Interpretation from the University of the Arts.

“I wanted to learn more about the exhibition process since I’d worked at a museum, but I didn’t have the degree,” she said.

She worked as a Museum Education Specialist at the National Watch & Clock Museum in Columbia, PA., and as Director of Exhibitions & Collections for The Center for Art in Wood, formerly the Wood Turning Center, in Philadelphia.

In 2009, Kopko took full-time job at Target, Co. – five minutes from her home studio - which gave her more time to work on her art. That’s when she started her company, Papillion Dreams.She currently makes collages out of magazines and prints them on fabric to make purses. She opened an Etsy shop and currently sells her work through word of mouth and in retail stores, including The Art Shop.

“I’m keeping the business small scale with the idea of holding onto the unique qualities of each item,” she said.

With the holidays quickly approaching, Kopko hopes that shoppers will visit the The Art Shop to purchase unique and timeless gifts.

After I graduated from Moore, I continued working in politics and organized for PennEnvironment, PennPIRG and The Human Rights Campaign. I also had the opportunity to do citizen organization and mobilization in Colorado during the 2012 election. I left the non-profit sector to focus on breaking into the creative field. After a brief stint managing a coffee shop in Center City, I started working as a product/ fashion photographer for Linda’s Stuff, and now I work at a quickly expanding Smoke/Vaporizer shop in the Northeast as a photographer, graphic designer and anything visually related. In the coming months I’ll be opening up an ecommerce website for them.

When the Fine Arts major wasn’t interning at Mara Hoffman in NYC, she was traveling to Utah’s Bryce Canyon and Zion National Parks to research nature for her senior thesis.

Statsenko was the lucky recipient of both the 2014 Penny Fox Internship Fellowship and the Harriet Sartain Travel Fellowship, both competitive fellowships that were completed at the same time.

“I thought it would be hard to do both but I planned ahead,” Statsenko said. “I was able to fit everything in. It was intense because I didn’t have a day off all summer, but it was worth it.”

Statsenko was a design/production intern at Mara Hoffman, a fashion/textiles brand that focuses on print design, bright colors and patterns. A Textile Design and Business minor, Statsenko felt it was a great fit for her skill set. She worked closely with the design, PR and production team, worked on patterns digitally in Photoshop and Illustrator, picked up and dropped off samples to factories, assisted the stylist on photo shoots and more.

“I minored in Textile Design to learn as much as I can and apply it to the real world,” she said. “I want to combine art with fashion – it’s perfect for me. Majoring in Fine Arts was good. I learned how to apply color, texture and pattern design in a unique way towards fashion. I’m more interested in surface print design than construction. I just apply it on fashion.”

In July, she traveled to Utah for several days as part of her travel fellowship. She researched the colors, textures and physical weight of Bryce Canyon and Zion National Parks.

“I was looking for the feeling of ‘gestalt’ – the whole is greater than the sum of its parts,” she said. “That happened for me. I didn’t understand sculpture before I experienced Richard Serra’s work and I had the experience of losing oneself, but at the same time being aware of one’s presence. This feeling of monumental mountains reminded me of Serra’s work. I wanted to experience a difference environment.”

She got that this summer. Thanks to the Locks Career Center and the Business Scholar in the Arts program, Statsenko said she felt confident enough to take risks and apply for both fellowships. The additional funding allowed her to live in New York City and travel to Utah.

“[In BSA] we focus on what we want to do when we graduate and how to apply business skills,” she said. “Eventually I’d like to be an entrepreneur and have my own textiles business. My fine arts and textiles background prepared me for the creative vision. The business minor and BSA prepared me for the business side of it.”

“I learned how to market myself and my work, just go out and not be afraid to ask for what you want,” she said. “This internship gave me a real glimpse of what I want to do when I graduate and confirmed I’m in the right field.”

Originally from the Ukraine, Statsenko, 25, learned about Moore in high school. She took five years off after high school graduation to work and save money. She took classes at a community college and at an arts center to build her portfolio.

“It was a blessing because it gave me time to research and find out what I really wanted to do,” she said. She focused on sculpture during her first two years at Moore and then on painting during her senior year. “Fine Arts allowed me to explore different mediums, be more creative.”

Statsenko said she values the community at Moore and the freedom to research what she’s interested in, but with the practical guidance of teachers such as Heather Ujjie (fine arts faculty), from whom she learned about the Mara Hoffman internship.

“I didn’t want to feel like a number at college,” she said. “I wanted personal connections with the teachers and the people I went to school with, and that’s what I got.”

I am currently an Assistant Designer at Jones New York. Since graduating I've done numerous internships at Alice + Olivia and Cynthia Rowley. I've also freelanced at Kate Spade NY, Kate Spade Saturday, and Club Monaco.

Maxine Whiteley likes to stay one step ahead of the game when it comes to her future as an aspiring textile designer.

A Fine Arts junior with a minor in Textile Design, Whiteley is diligent about professionally documenting her work on the social media sites Behance and Tumblr, as well as on her own personal Website. She updates the sites at least once a week.

“I really just want to approach my junior and senior year in the most professional way possible,” Whiteley said. “I feel like I’m ahead of the game and it’s really important to be. I don’t want to feel overwhelmed by the amount of documentation that needs to be done when I graduate. If you get yourself on the Internet as much as possible, it becomes an ongoing practice.”

Whiteley first began documenting her work through a Digital Portfolio class she completed during her sophomore year. She was required to create a Website, as well as Tumblr and Behance pages, and learn how to professionally photograph her work.

Tumblr is a microblogging platform that allows users to post multimedia and other content to a short-form blog. Moore began using Behance – the leading portfolio portal - this year as part of the College’s career focused mission.

Behance allows artists to post projects and have a centralized portfolio that links directly with social media networking sites and personal websites. Companies can explore the work and access talent on a global scale.

“After my Digital Portfolio class ended, I just kind of kept up with Behance because I liked that it had all of that documentation of my work,” Whiteley said. “It makes you look a lot more professional. I use my Tumblr page more for works in progress and inspirational images. Behance is more for finished work. My own Website has updates on what I’m doing, gallery shows and a sketchbook project I’m doing right now.”

This summer, Whiteley was contacted by the Double Decker curating agency in London and nominated to be part of the Talents Archive Project of the Onassis Cultural Center in Athens, Greece. She was sent a sketchbook to fill with work that would expose her creative process. When she finishes the sketchbook, Whiteley will send it back to the OCC, where it will be displayed with the books of emerging student artists from around the world.

“Being a part of Talents Archive is an opportunity for me to gain international attention,” she said. “I'm only 20 years old and this is not something I thought I would be capable of doing at such a young age. For me, it feels like an extremely successful beginning to my career. It's also an opportunity for me to represent Moore at an international level, which is a responsibility I'm honored to have.”

Whiteley has already begun researching where she wants to do her required internship next summer, hopefully in Philadelphia or New York City. In her artist statement, Whiteley said she makes pieces “that resemble textile work through the continuing theme of pattern or the potential of it. I explore these qualities primarily through drawing, painting and sculpture.”

“I recently discovered that I want to work more on interiors than apparel,” she said. “I’ve done a lot of research and it’s important for me to hand draw and hand paint. Companies that hire artists to do preliminary sketches is really important to me.”

Whiteley said she first learned of Moore when she (literally) drove past the College following a high school crew race. Originally from upstate New York, she really liked Moore's location and Googled the College as soon as she got home. She later came back for a tour and loved it. The rest was history.

“I didn’t apply anywhere else because I felt like Moore was the right place,” she said. “I felt like they wanted me here. Other colleges I felt like I was reaching out to them and trying to get them to notice me and I feel like Moore noticed me right away, which was important to me. They sent me handwritten letters, called and e-mailed me, and it was a more personal process.”

Whiteley has been an artist since high school, where she took Advanced Placement art classes and figure drawing classes at an outside art center.

“I always knew I wanted to be an artist and by knowing that I felt like I really had to think ahead of the game about how to promote myself,” she said. “It’s such a competitive industry so I try to always think of the next step, anything I can do to be prepared for the industry ahead of time.”

As a Visionary Woman Scholar, Whiteley has had the opportunity to network with professionals who are at the height of their industries, particularly at the Visionary Woman Awards, where proceeds are raised to support scholarships.

“Every single year at the gala when I’m sitting next to alumni and people in the industry, I can talk to them one on one, whereas I don’t think I’d get that experience elsewhere. They always give advice that’s really helpful and personal.”

When she’s not busy trying to make a name for herself, Whiteley is active on Moore’s Student Leadership Board and Student Life Committee and recently joined the Textile and Fiber Arts Club. She’s also a work-study student in the Development Office at Moore.

I decided to come to Moore because it was the first school where I walked in and felt like I would fit in. The student leaders told me about the type of work they made and told me about the teachers. I felt like I belonged here even before I filled out an application.

Moore is a great place to learn. In my studio classes I was allowed to try anything. I used my own abstract photography, hand drawn type, and sometimes my own paintings. My teachers pushed me to make my design stand out. In my academic classes, I was constantly learning. These classes let me research and write about what I like or what I am curious about.

My education has allowed me to create a niche for myself. I have two sets of skills. I can design and create, but I can also write, research and present my ideas. I can take these skills anywhere. After graduation, I was nominated to be the Class of 2014 young alumni representative on Moore's Board of Managers.

I received the Sarah Peter Fellowship and decided to pursue my life-long interest in “sideshows,” a group of performance acts that showcase human oddities and feature crowd-pleasing feats such as sword swallowing and walking on glass.

It started in August of 2010, when I attended sideshow school in Coney Island, NY. Based on this experience, I realized that I wanted to spend my fellowship documenting myself learning new sideshow acts. As research, I took in sideshow performances in Old City, Philadelphia; Salem, MA; and Washington, DC. I also filmed my own live performance as part of a sideshow by graduates of the Coney Island Sideshow School.

This experience has inspired me to become the art instead of making the art. I’m trying to make my art come alive on different levels because I find that the living acts are more visually striking and valid than a flat photograph on the wall. After graduation, I become a sideshow performer while also working in a portrait studio.

After graduating from Moore College of Art & Design in 2012, I accepted an internship opportunity in Switzerland with a company called ICON Worldwide. I spent my summer after graduation freelancing for Bosha Design + Communications (where I interned as a Junior-going-to-be-Senior.) Then, the following September I began my journey and working experience in Switzerland. I fell in love with the country and the design culture that I was submerged into at ICON Worldwide. I loved it so much that I was even offered to come back after the three months to extend my working experience as a freelance designer as opposed to an intern. I worked a total of six months in the country and got to do a lot of traveling on my free time. It was an opportunity that shaped my career and personality into the designer that I am now.

When I came back to the States, I began my job hunt. I continued to freelance for Bosha Design + Communications, which led me to two other companies that I freelanced for— 20/10 Solutions and Mease Communications. I split my weeks between the two companies for a total of about ten months, as I continued to search for a full-time position.

Finally, after multiple job interviews, I landed a job with CKR Interactive, in Bensalem, PA. Here, I am the go-to Graphic Designer for the Philadelphia office. Our corporate office is located in San Jose, California, with two remote offices in Chicago, Illinois and Cleveland, Ohio. The Philadelphia office is growing quickly and I've learned so much since I started in June of 2014. Moore College provided me with the education, skill-set and opportunities that really carved out a career path that I couldn't be more happier with!

So when it came time to choose a junior year internship, she looked towards the United Arab Emirates.

With the help of the Penny Fox Internship Fellowship, Thomas, a fashion major, was able to travel to the city of Sharjah, near Dubai, for the summer and work as an intern for Aiisha Ramadan, a local designer.

I’ve been inspired by the Middle East since high school -- the art, the people and the culture,” Thomas said. “When it came time to research internships, I looked to the UAE first because I knew how much it was advancing in fashion and art. I definitely wanted to go over there and work closely with a designer. I found out about Aiisha, connected to her aesthetic and wanted to work for her.”

As an intern, Thomas was responsible for overseeing operations when Ramadan was away, working on her look book and pricing the collection. She was also able to choose fabrics for designs and name the dresses in Ramadan’s Spring/Summer 2014 collection.

“The experience was really great,” Thomas said. “I was able to get a sense of how a small company is run and work closely with the designer, who was a lot of help.”

As a woman, living in Sharjah was an eye-opening experience, Thomas said.

“It was very conservative compared to Dubai,” she said. “It’s one of the historical districts and one of the most conservative areas in the UAE."

While she had one other female friend at work, Thomas said she was on her own most of the time.

“It could be very lonely, especially during Ramadan (a month of fasting for Muslims) when everyone was fasting during the day,” she said. “And when it came time to break the fast, everyone would be with their family and friends eating at “iftar” dinner (breaking of fast) and I ate alone at Pizza Hut.”

But despite the challenges of living abroad, Thomas was able to adapt well to her environment and become more independent.

“I’m always open to new things,” she said. “This was the second time I’ve been far away from home so I’m used to it.”

As the recipient of the Sis Grenald Leadership Fellowship, Thomas traveled to Palestine the summer after her sophomore year to teach art to children in a refugee camp.

“I’ve always been interested in the Middle East,” she said. “If I wasn’t a fashion design major I’d probably be doing Middle Eastern studies.”

As a fashion designer, Thomas naturally gravitates towards Eastern influences in her work, which she describes as, “very regal, very elegant, and a little conservative yet mixed with a Western modern edge.”

Thomas said she hopes to one day return to the United Arab Emirates and gain more experience working there. For now, she’s looking forward to the spring Fashion Show at Moore, where she said her senior collection will be inspired by Dubai.

Potter, a Fine Arts major, has collaborated with Sreshta Rit Premnath, Assistant Professor of Foundation, Fine Arts, and Photography & Digital Arts, to curate a 15-week series of feature-length documentaries shown every Tuesday through the end of April 2014 in the Stewart Auditorium.

The film series is in conjunction with Potter’s film club, Rogue Screenings, and Premnath’s “Documenting the Social Landscape” class. Films shown include Leviathan (2012), an experimental, almost wordless documentary on the North American fishing industry and Werner Herzog’s Happy People (2010).

“We wanted to show interesting documentaries, but beyond the content, all the films we’re showing also say something about the process of documenting,” she said. “It has been a great collaborative experience.”

Potter considers herself a sculptor, but “with a heavy emphasis in photography and video so that all of my objects tend to be performative.”

“I was so heavy on craft when I first came here, but it’s slowly becoming more about the image than the actual object,” she said.

For her thesis, “Why do I Selfie?” Potter is examining the “selfie,” “selfhood,” “Instagramming” and what she calls “cell phone cinema.”

Right now, much of her art work exists online, most recently on the OKCupid dating site. “I posted my artist statement as a dating profile,” she said.

Potter is perhaps best known for her CarboCats, taxidermy forms covered in 20 pounds worth of elbow macaroni. They were featured in Philadelphia Magazine’s food blog and were also responsible for her upcoming participation in the Select Fair NYC this May.

“Everybody loves the CarboCats, they have a life of their own,” she said. “They are mostly about apathy... that I would spend so much time on what is essentially a 2nd grade craft product.”

Potter was granted an artist residency this summer with the University of Gastronomy in Bra, Italy, where she will put together a film program. Over spring break, she worked with video artist Micheal Raftery from Richmond, Va., shooting a short reality show series.

Potter completed her Foundation years at the Maryland Institute College of Art and transferred to Moore as a sophomore/junior.

Potter said she chose Moore because she was interested in careers for women and was impressed by the College’s emphasis on career placement. She also appreciated the fact that faculty were so involved in the Philadelphia gallery scene.

“Moore is an incredibly small, close-knit place,” she said. “It’s incredibly unique. I will forever be grateful for my fellow Moore women. The artists I’ve become close to here are the strongest, most interesting women I’ve ever met.”